Fallen leaves

So many leaves, no two alike. Everywhere we go I find leaves, some I draw, some I just look at. Leaves are such ephemeral things – the colours and patterns they hold don’t last, in a matter of hours they have changed, sometimes to more interesting and vivid colours and shapes, sometimes to fade, crumpling back to the earth in an endless cycle.

These were inspired by leaves collected on a single walk, a mix of varieties, in a range of states of decomposition. Green, living leaves are beautiful in their own way, but for a drawing it is the ones giving a final burst of energy that I enjoy.

In doing the drawing I have enhanced and exaggerated the colours and the forms, allowing the leaves a new life of a different kind altogether. They have become almost fleshy, solid and firm, floating on the page, unlike the delicate leaves that inspired them.

The support is yupo synthetic paper, 47 x 64 cm. The base drawing was in Liquid Pencil and the main drawing was in Caran D’Ache Luminance and Derwent Colourfast pencils.

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Author: anna warren portfolio

I draw, I paint, I am a printmaker. Always searching for the interesting detail in the world around me.

15 thoughts

  1. In making the leaves more fleshy they become deliciously edible like fruit or perhaps peppers. It’s like you’ve injected life back into them – and potential nourishment.

    Have you noticed there is a small insect underneath the third leaf from the top on the left? I would never have noticed if I hadn’t enlarged your drawing on my desktop screen. I then thought the insect was sitting on my screen but no, you have photographed it. Of course it looks right at home among the leaves.

    Your drawing is a seamless fusion of observation and imagination.

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    1. That is so funny about the insect! I hadn’t noticed it at all, but of course now it is so obvious. At first I thought you were referring to one of the little splashes of Liquid Pencil that appear here and there, but no, it’s a real fly! Maybe I should actually draw one in…. I rather like the idea.

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